Luke’s Place Advocacy Director, Pamela Cross, participated in a panel discussion on gender-based violence at the 2024 Rural Ontario Municipal Association (ROMA) conference held on January 21-23, 2024. The panel discussion, “Responding to Gender-Based Violence”, chaired by Mississippi Mills Mayor, Christa Lowry, was the first time this topic has been discussed at such a large gathering of municipal officials from across Ontario.
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Luke’s Place held its 11th Annual Family Court Support Worker (FCSW) training in downtown Toronto the week of November 20th. There was quite a buzz of excitement as FCSWs gathered from all over Ontario in person for the first time since the pandemic.
One worker said it so well:
“It is so good to finally connect again in person with colleagues I have only seen via ZOOM.”
One of the highlights was the emergency motions boot camp presented by Gabrielle Slater,
Here we are, once again, facing December 6th, the National Day of Remembrance and Action, instituted in 1991 to commemorate the women killed in the 1989 Ecole Polytechnique mass shooting.
But one minute of silence, one day when Canadian flags are flown at half-mast, one day of remembering, even one day of acting is not enough;
On November 16th, Luke’s Place Advocacy Director was a guest speaker at the Walrus Talks Gender-Based Violence live and streamed event at the Isabel Bader Theatre in Toronto, Ontario.
The event, presented by the Canadian Women’s Foundation featured seven speakers discussing how we can change a culture that doesn’t have a good track record of supporting abuse survivors or even of talking about the abuse women,
The creation of a new coercive control offence in the Canadian Criminal Code is being explored following the tabling of two private member’s bills as well as the consideration of information and testimony shared during the study by the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights on controlling or coercive conduct within intimate relationships,
On November 25th we acknowledge the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and the first day of 16 Days of Action to Eliminate Violence Against Women around the world.
At Luke’s Place, with your support, we work tirelessly to eliminate violence against women by increasing their access to justice.
In times of crisis, women fleeing abusive situations often require immediate family court orders to ensure the safety of themselves and their children. One way to do this is by filing an emergency motion, also known as an “ex parte” motion.
Luke’s Place Staff Lawyer Min Jin and Legal Services Program Manager Phebe Quaye,
Luke’s Place Pamela Cross was selected as the Pixel Project’s Inspirational Interview for October 2023.
The Pixel Project is a completely virtual, volunteer-led global non-profit organisation whose mission is to raise awareness, funds and volunteer power for the cause to end violence against women using the power of the internet, social media,
Coercive control appeared in the revised Divorce Act as part of the definition of family violence, requiring courts to consider it when making any decisions related to children and parenting. Since then, there have been discussions at the federal level about making coercive control a criminal offence.
The House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights has produced a report on this topic.
Luke’s Place has been closely following the issue of criminalizing coercive control in Canada. The federal government, along with its provincial and territorial partners, is currently conducting virtual panel discussions to receive feedback on this important issue. On September 28, 2023, Luke’s Place Legal Director, Emily Murray, participated in one of the virtual panels to share some concerns about the impact of criminalization on women’s family law cases and to call on the government to look for ways to improve the existing criminal system for survivors before creating a new criminal offence.
